New Cinema

“A work of shocking emotional immediacy … Denis is one of the most variable of great directors.”

Richard Brody, The New Yorker, on Both Sides of the Blade

September 5 (Monday) September 7 (Wednesday) September 10 (Saturday) September 11 (Sunday) September 15 (Thursday) 6:30 pm 8:25 pm 6:00 pm 8:25 pm 8:35 pm

Both Sides of the Blade

(Avec amour et acharnement) France 2022 Claire Denis 116 min. DCP

Vancouver Premiere

“Thorny and unabashedly sexy … [A] slow-roiling, superbly acted melodrama.”

Justin Chang, Los Angeles Times

The first of two 2022 films by Claire Denis, whose previous picture High Life featured in our “Best of the 2010s” program, this sensuous, sharply serrated portrait of a midlife love-triangle earned the arthouse eminence the directing trophy at Berlin. Set in a humdrum, COVID-era Paris, Both Sides stars Juliette Binoche (in her third Denis outing) as Sara, a radio-show host in a loving, long-term relationship with Jean (Vincent Lindon), an ex-con still adjusting to life on the outside. Enter François (Grégoire Colin), Sara’s old flame and Jean’s former business partner, whose sudden reappearance ignites a feverish passion in Sara that sends her tailspinning toward infidelity. Characteristic of Denis, here working again with writer Christine Angot (Let the Sunshine In), the film’s richly drawn heroine is achingly, upsettingly human, undone by her own transgressions. Denis players Mati Diop and Lola Créton appear in minor roles; Tindersticks supply the evocative score. October 10 (Monday) October 12 (Wednesday) October 16 (Sunday) October 20 (Thursday) 6:30 pm 8:30 pm 6:30 pm 8:30 pm

Murina

Croatia/Brazil/USA/Slovenia 2021 Antoneta Alamat Kusijanović 95 min. DCP

Vancouver Premiere

Winner of the Caméra d’Or at Cannes 2021, Croatian-born writerdirector Antoneta Alamat Kusijanović’s debut feature is one of the most riveting and lusciously realized coming-of-age films in recent memory. A war-of-wills drama set on (and in the waters encircling) a paradisal Croatian island, Murina follows fiery 17-yearold Julija (astonishing newcomer Gracija Filipović) in her efforts to wrestle control of her life away from her overbearing father Ante (Leon Lučev). Julija’s mother (Danica Čurčić), meanwhile, suffers a similarly stifled existence. When Ante’s former friend and employer (Māori actor Cliff Curtis) arrives on business, old wounds are reopened and nasty jealousies take hold—and Julija discovers, perhaps, a means of escape. Rapturously shot by French cinematographer Hélène Louvart, past collaborator of Agnès Varda, Claire Denis, and Alice Rohrwacher, this sun-soaked, rage-against-the-patriarch picture, executive produced by Martin Scorsese, signals Kusijanović as a distinctive new cinematic voice. In Croatian and Spanish with English subtitles. “An exceptional debut … If Patricia Highsmith had ever written a coming-of-age story set on the rocky, clear-watered Croatian coastline, it might have looked a lot like Kusijanović’s bright, brooding debut … A dazzling sunshine noir.”